Dynamic Dioramas

Some of the dioramas at the Helsinki Natural History Museum. Many of the animal poses are dynamic, which paradoxically makes the stillness of the displays and the death of the animals more present. Most of the dioramas at the American Museum of Natural History in New York have the animals in a state of rest (the Wolf Diorama based on Gunflint Lake in Minnesota in the American Hall of Mammals at the AMNH would be an exception) and are much more uncanny as a result. There is a lot of care in the foreground work in Helsinki but the backgrounds are around displays with sharp corners, which somewhat deflates their illusory pleasures.